Launch Africa Ventures

Launch Africa Ventures is a venture capital firm founded in 2020 and based in Ebene, Mauritius, that funds early-stage startups across Africa, focusing on seed and pre-Series A opportunities. It seeks investments across fintech, healthtech, climate tech, agritech, edtech, transportation and logistics, mobility, e-commerce, software as a service, artificial intelligence, big data, and analytics.

Janade Du Plessis

Co-Founder and Managing Partner

Zachariah George

Co-Founder and Managing Partner

Mohamed Karar

Venture Partner F1 and F2

Michael Mutie

VC Associate

Janade Plessis Ph.D

Co-Founder and Managing Partner

Hannah Subayi

Partner, Board Member and Member of the Investment Committee

Uwem Uwemakpan

Head of Investments, F2

Past deals in Nigeria

Termii

Seed Round in 2023
Termii is a Lagos-based company founded in 2014 that provides a cross-channel messaging and customer engagement platform tailored for African businesses. The platform facilitates communication with customers through SMS, email, voice, and instant messaging, enabling teams to secure repeat customers via personalized outreach. In addition to messaging services, Termii offers a suite of business applications that address various needs such as digital branding, sales, marketing, customer relationship management, eCommerce, accounting, inventory, and project management. This comprehensive approach allows clients to enhance their business operations and improve customer engagement across multiple channels.

Kredibank

Seed Round in 2022
Kredi is a neo bank building Africa's one-stop shop for digital financial services. Kredi is a platform that eliminates all the challenges of using multiple applications and allows users to manage all aspects of their financial lives. We are fully licensed by the Central Bank of Nigeria. We provide access to digital financial services such as savings, credit, payment, investments, and insurance to all consumers in Nigeria in one place.

ShopMeAway

Venture Round in 2022
ShopMeAway is a cross-border ecommerce and logistics company that connects global brands and distributors with an integrated ecommerce module and a cross-border delivery network to serve underserved markets in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, and Asia. The platform provides order placement, payments, and delivery capabilities to enable consumers to shop from international websites while helping brands reach new customers. Operational since 2018 in Senegal, the company has expanded to Ivory Coast and has plans to enter Nigeria and Morocco, with longer-term expansion into Latin America, the Middle East, and Asia. In 2023, it partnered with Amazon to distribute its full catalog to its client network, demonstrating its ability to scale international distribution.

Edves

Venture Round in 2022
Edves is a digital infrastructure provider for K-12 schools in Africa that designs AI-powered school and learning management software to automate processes from enrollment to graduation. Its platform supports enrollment, fees payment, online learning, e-books, video tutorials and virtual classrooms, with analytics on student and school performance. The solution is used by more than 1,700 schools across 11 countries, enabling educators, school owners, and government agencies to track performance, identify fee defaulters, generate annual reports, and streamline administrative and learning operations to improve learning outcomes.

Edves

Seed Round in 2021
Edves is a digital infrastructure provider for K-12 schools in Africa that designs AI-powered school and learning management software to automate processes from enrollment to graduation. Its platform supports enrollment, fees payment, online learning, e-books, video tutorials and virtual classrooms, with analytics on student and school performance. The solution is used by more than 1,700 schools across 11 countries, enabling educators, school owners, and government agencies to track performance, identify fee defaulters, generate annual reports, and streamline administrative and learning operations to improve learning outcomes.

Releaf

Seed Round in 2021
Founded in Nigeria in 2017, Releaf operates as an online marketplace connecting buyers and sellers of various agricultural products such as cassava, palm oil, ginger, cashew nuts, fish, maize, cocoa, kola nuts, yam, and sesame seeds. It also provides extension services to smallholders, acts as a buyer for their products, and converts raw materials into factory-grade inputs.

OmniRetail

Seed Round in 2021
OmniRetail is a B2B e-commerce platform founded in 2019, headquartered in Lagos, Nigeria. It aims to digitize the consumer goods supply chain from manufacturers through distributors to retailers, improving reliability, visibility, and financial capabilities.

MarketForce

Seed Round in 2021
Founded in 2018, MarketForce is a technology company based in the US, Kenya, and Nigeria. It operates an asset-light business model, providing a comprehensive B2B commerce and fintech platform, 'RejaReja', empowering African merchants to digitize their inventory sourcing, ordering, payments, and access financing. The platform also enables merchants to resell digital financial services like airtime and bill payments. MarketForce is operational in five Sub-Saharan African markets, serving over 200,000 merchants and 50 consumer brands.

Rivy

Pre Seed Round in 2021
Rivy is making it easier to finance small and medium sized businesses in Africa. There is a need for financing of $158 bn for SMEs in Nigeria alone. To start, Rivy o helps SMEs access and spend lender capital effectively. During their first full operational year in 2020, the Rivy o co--founders leveraged their domain expertise and founding experience to beat their 2020 goal by 50%.

Alpha Direct

Seed Round in 2021
Alpha Direct is an Africa-focused Insurtech company headquartered in Botswana. It leverages cloud technology, big data, and AI to deliver innovative insurance products tailored for Africa's growing consumer market.

Trove

Seed Round in 2021
Trove Technologies Limited operates an online platform designed to facilitate investment in a range of securities, including stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and cryptocurrencies. Based in Lekki, Nigeria, Trove aims to simplify the investment process for beginners by providing an accessible application that allows users to easily find and select investment opportunities. The platform features a user-friendly KYC process, brokerage services, and a personalized news feed related to the assets traded. Trove enables investors to participate in both local and international markets, offering access to Nigerian stocks, government bonds, and a selection of cryptocurrency assets. Through its seamless approach to micro-investing, Trove empowers users to engage with the financial markets with ease.

Wella Health

Venture Round in 2021
WellaHealth is a startup focused on improving healthcare access for low-income individuals and families in Nigeria. The company has developed a digital triage bot that provides guidance based on the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control guidelines, allowing users to log their health responses for potential follow-up by public health authorities. In addition to this innovative tool, WellaHealth offers micro-health insurance plans that target prevalent diseases, providing affordable coverage for treatments and medications. Their platform connects users to a network of pharmacies and healthcare professionals, enabling them to manage their health needs without facing significant financial strain.
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